Through the Fire and the Flames
by escalus01
Summary: Based on Soul Calibur II. A young Athenian swordswoman faces the monster known as Inferno.


Disclaimer: I do not own Soul Calibur.

**Through the Fire and the Flames**

Cassandra groaned with effort as she used her sword to push herself off of her knees and back onto her feet, she almost stumbled as she fought to regain her balance. The massive amount of heat in the air was getting to her and she was not sure how much longer her body could stand up to it. She could feel the sweat covering every inch of her body and her arms and legs felt heavy and weak, it took an enormous amount of effort just to raise her sword.

She shook her head to clear her mind of the fugue imposed upon it by the heat and regained her senses just in time to react to creature's massive blade descending toward her. She raised her shield and felt her legs come dangerously close to buckling under the impact.

She thrust her own sword at her enemy and missed, before backing away as quickly as she could. She fell back not just for a reprieve from the fighting but also because the sheer heat radiating from the monster made it too dangerous to stay close for long. That was part of her problem, how was she supposed to defeat an enemy she could barely even approach? At he beginning of the fight she had decided that her best option would be to charge the enemy, throw a couple of quick strikes and retreat, then repeat the process. However this posed yet another problem as it went against her usual method of pressing an opponent until he or she made a mistake and left an opening. It also did not help that this monstrosity was apparently too skilled to be caught of guard by such a simple tactic. Nevertheless she _would_ win she had to; it was not just her life riding on the outcome.

She bent her knees slightly preparing herself to charge forward and aim a few more blows at the creature, suppressing a wince as a sharp pain flared through her body. She was covered in cuts, bruises and even some burns, none of which were too severe, but they combined with the heat and her fatigue were effecting her ability to fight. Ignoring the pain she dug her feet into the ground, careful to avoid the fiery veins carved into the floor and once again tried to perceive some sort of weakness in her opponent.

It was an abomination, that was the best word for it. The closest she could come to describing it was to say that it looked like a human skeleton that had been set ablaze, only that was not quite right as the bones seemed to be horribly distorted and an aura of evil seemed to emanate from it, from every part of it except one. Piercing down through the centre of the creature, almost like a spine, was a sword and just by looking at it she could tell it was not as evil as the rest of the beast. It was like a being of light trapped in the belly of a demon.

The environment itself had seemingly changed to accommodate this monster, where once she had been standing in an old temple of some sort she now saw a barren, lifeless landscape. The sky was a dark red, filled clouds the colour of congealed blood and occasionally split by a fork of scarlet lightning and the ground was broken with molten rock running between the cracks like blood in a vein. The atmosphere was made oppressive by a mixture of the overwhelming heat attacking her body and the chilling evil terrorising her very soul. Cassandra remembered that she had been about to destroy the infernal blade when everything had changed and she had found herself in this nightmare. Perhaps soul edge had created this wicked realm in order to protect itself, but did it really have the power to do that? A sudden terrifying thought struck her, what if the land had not changed? What if she had been taken somewhere else? What if this creature had somehow dragged her down into the very depths of Hades?

These thoughts where driven from her mind as the creature charged her once again and she brought up her shield. The sound of metal clashing against metal and then to her horror the sound of her shield shattering upon impact and she stumbled backwards almost losing her balance. The creature pressed it's advantage, lashing out with it's own shield and knocking her onto the flat of her back. The monster leapt an inhuman height into the air and switched it's sword into a reverse grip. She moved just in time, rolling to the side she _felt_ the blade pass through the air where she had been not a moment before.

Cassandra struggled back to her feet, tightening her grip on the sword in her right hand and turned to the creature. Doing her best to ignore her body's complaints at the abuse it had suffered she returned to a fighting stance and prepared herself for the next attack. Which did not come, instead the beast dropped its stance and emitted a deep rumbling noise that sounded suspiciously like laughter, _mocking_ laughter. She felt her anger well up inside her but quickly reined it in; it had already almost cost her her life once in this fight.

When she had first approached the soul edge to destroy it and it had sent her to this place she had panicked, casting her gaze everywhere in a desperate attempt to figure out what had happened, she did not notice straight away that the soul edge had disappeared. Then she had heard _something_ behind her and had spun around to face whatever horror had awaited her. What she had seen was the fiery fiend she now faced with its hands wrapped around the hilt of soul edge. She had watched in a fascinated horror as the flesh-like metal of the evil blade had begun to transform and shrink eventually splitting in two. When the transformation had finished the monster had been holding weapons similar to her own.

She had reacted immediately by drawing her sword and charging forwards, only to be beaten back easily. The creature had sent her flying with only a single thrust of its shield. She had landed in a heap on the floor, barely missing one of the lava-veins.

As she had dragged herself back to her feet she had realised something, the style the creature had fought back with, had beat her back with she recognised it, she recognised it because it was her own. That thing had beaten her with her own technique! Her anger had begun to rise and she had glared at her enemy across the battlefield and it let out one of its deep rumbling noises. Her anger became uncontrollable and, fear forgotten, she had charged forward. That had been her single biggest mistake in this whole battle.

In the following furious exchange of blows she had not been able to land a single hit on the creature but it had landed more than a few on her, none were fateful thankfully (although she could not tell whether that was due to her own skill or whether that thing was toying with her), but everyone stung and once more she had ended up sprawled on the ground. Fortunately Soul Edge seemed to be conducting the heat from its wielder and even though this meant that the wounds hurt more it also meant they were cauterised as soon as they were cleaved.

She was brought out of her reverie by a heavy impact that knocked the wind out of her as the beast struck her yet again with it's shield and once more she was sent flying back a few feet. As she struggled to her feet_ again_ she realised that the creature _was_ playing with her. She had not been concentrating right then, her mind had been elsewhere, it could have finished her easily but it had not. She clenched her fist determined that she would make it pay for that.

As her enemy charged, this time possibly to make the killing blow, she had waited. She waited right until the last moment just as the enemy began it's strike and mustering all the speed she could she drove her blade up to the hilt into what could pass for it's chest.

At first she thought it had not worked and began to despair and began preparing for the inevitable counter-attack, she would keep fighting even if it was almost impossible for her to win. However before she could even pull her blade free the thing let out a piercing screech that caused her to fall to her knees and cover her ears, feeling like the inside of her head was about to erupt, then the beast rose steadily into the air and exploded. Immediately the heaviness in the air began to lift and the foul landscape around her began to fade and eventually she found herself back in the old temple, a pleasantly cool breeze passing by. She felt a rush of jubilation, she had done it, she'd won, now her sister and her sister's children would be safe, with this thought in her head she closed her eyes and whispered her sisters name.

Cassandra turned her gaze her gaze over to where she guessed the monster would have been standing and saw a sword that was neither Soul Edge nor her own standing upright with its tip buried in the ground. It was the sword she had seen earlier through the flames in the creatures chest, now that it was free she could see that it looked almost like a piece of art. It looked elegant and smooth, silvery blue in colour with its hilt in the shape of a pair of wings.

Slowly she began to walk towards it and did her best to ignore the pain shooting through her, the adrenaline was starting to leave her blood and her body was beginning to feel all the abuse it had been put through, she knew that in a matter of minutes she would barely be able to stand. When she reached the sword she extended her hand and grasped it by the hilt. Immediately she felt a soothing sensation sweep through her and the pain dull, although not receded completely, this relief did not stop at her body it also seemed to heal her mind and soul too. A smile broke out on her face, one filed with peace and triumph as she pulled the sword from the ground and once more casting her eyes once more around the ruins. She spotted her pack leaning against one of the walls and began to walk over to it, a task she surprisingly found easier than she had mere seconds ago. The continued to smile as she moved, she had just defeated a powerful opponent and freed her sister from her curse, now she should have something to eat and drink and maybe see if she had any spare clothes left and then rest in the town not far from here before she began her journey home.

As she knelt down next to her pack and began to rummage through it she spoke:

"And that's the lesson for today."

* * *

Okay, I wrote this story a while ago and thought that, with a bit of polish, it would be worthy of publishing online. This was written before the game made Cassandra out to be a bit of a ditz, although they have kept her resolve and yes Dragonforce inspired the title.

A quick question, is the rating okay? The way the site describes the ratings in regards to violence has me a little confused so I put it at a T rating to be safe.

So, how was it? Please read and review, constructive criticism is always welcome.


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